The Downs, Herne Bay


A break in the weather followed by a quick dash over to a historical sand lizard site near Herne bay with Brett Lewis.

This was my first visit to The Downs (and Beltinge Cliff) and I was quite impressed by the sheer size of the site, so close to Herne Bay, and the excellent reptile habitat.

Beltinge Cliff and The Downs

The Downs, Looking West Towards Herne Bay

So, could sand lizard still be there? I don't think so. The site offers excellent habitat for viviparous lizards (and we saw several during our visit). However, there is no exposed sand (other than at Bishopstone Glen a little further along the coast). The Down is also North facing and receives the full force of northerly winds that blow from the arctic. At the moment I'm not convinced that sand lizard ever occurred here. So what's the evidence? Well I have a record on the county database that was submitted via the Biological Recording Centre and dates back to 1950. The site locality is described as "Herne Bay (near)". There is also an interesting account of green lizards in M.C. Cooke's 'Our Reptiles and Batracians' (1893). Cooke describes a paper that appeared in Zoologist (p. 2707) by Dr. Bromfield. Dr. Bromfield states:

"I am told, on competent authority, that Lacerta viridis is quite frequent, and even abundant, in the neighbourhood of Herne Bay".

Could these green lizards really be sand lizards? Well, according to Cooke, Thomas Bell (the author of British Reptiles) actually received a specimen from Herne Bay (where is that specimen now I wonder!). Bell considered the specimen to be the green lizard of Guernsey and not the 'smaller green lizard of Poole'.

So do we in fact have green lizards at Herne Bay?! Time will tell...

Posted: Thu - September 30, 2004 at 05:18 pm        

©